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Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Growing up on the outskirts of Dallas, Texas, Ellis first heard the electric guitar performed by George Barnes on a radio program. This experience is said to have inspired him to take up the guitar. He became proficient on the instrument by the time he entered North Texas State University as a music major. Ellis majored in music, but because they did not yet have a guitar program at that time, he studied the string bass. Unfortunately, due to lack of funds, his college days were short lived. In 1941 Herb dropped out of college and toured for 6 months with a band from the University of Kansas.
In 1943 joined Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra and it was with Gray's band that he got his first recognition in the jazz magazines. After Gray's band, Ellis joined the Jimmy Dorsey band where he played some of his first recorded solos. Ellis remained with Dorsey through 1947, traveling and recording extensively, and playing in dance halls and movie palaces. Then came a turnabout that would change Ellis's career forever. Then, as pianist Lou Carter told journalist Robert Dupuis in a 1996 interview, "The Dorsey band had a six-week hole in the schedule. The three of us had played together some with the big band. John Frigo, who had already left the band, knew the owner of the Peter Stuyvesant Hotel in Buffalo. We went in there and stayed six months. And that's how the group the Soft Winds were born."

The Soft Winds was fashioned after the Nat King Cole Trio. They stayed together until 1952. Herb Ellis then joined the Oscar Peterson Trio (replacing Barney Kessel), forming what Scott Yanow would later on refer to as "one of the most memorable of all the piano, guitar, and bass trios in jazz history".

Ellis became prominent after performing with the Oscar Peterson Trio from 1953 to 1958 along with pianist Peterson and bassist Ray Brown. He was a somewhat controversial member of the trio, because he was the only white person in the group in a time when racism was still very much widespread.
In addition to their great live and recorded work as the Oscar Peterson Trio, this unit served as the virtual "house rhythm section" for Norman Granz's Verve Records, supporting the likes of tenormen Ben Webster and Stan Getz, as well as trumpeters Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Eldridge, and Sweets Edison and other jazz stalwarts. With drummer Buddy Rich, they were also the backing band for popular "comeback" albums by the duet of Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong.The trio were also the mainstays of Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic concerts as they swept the jazz world, almost constantly touring the United States and Europe. Ellis left the Peterson Trio in November 1958, to be replaced not by a guitarist, but by drummer Ed Thigpen. The years of 1959 through 1960 found Ellis touring with Ella Fitzgerald.
The three provided a stirring rendition of "Tenderly" as a jazz improvisational backdrop to John Hubley's 1958 cartoon The Tender Game, Storyboard Film's version of the age-old story of boy falling head over heels for girl.[2]
With fellow jazz guitarists Barney Kessel, Charlie Byrd and Joe Pass, he created another ensemble, the Great Guitars.

Brooklyn-born Johnny Maestro began his career in 1957 as the original lead singer of The Crests, one of the first interracial groups of the recording industry. [1][2] Patricia VanDross, older sister to famed R&B singer Luther Vandross sang with Johnny Maestro during his tenure as lead vocalists with The Crests. After a regional hit with "My Juanita"/"Sweetest One" on the Joyce label, and two years of chart success on Coed Records with "16 Candles", "Step by Step", "The Angels Listened In", and "Trouble in Paradise", Maestro left the Crests for a solo career. Maestro was unable to reach his former chart heights with the Crests, but did have Top 40 hits with "What A Surprise" and "Model Girl" in 1961 and 1962.

By 1967, another New York group called the Del-Satins, who had made several non-charting recordings between 1959 and 1967 under their own name (and backing up Dion on his post-Belmonts recordings), were looking for a new lead singer to replace original lead Stan Ziska. Other members were brothers Fred and Tom Ferrara (baritone and bass), Les Cauchi (first tenor) and Bobby Failla (second tenor). According to Cauchi, members of the group ran into Maestro at a local gym, playing his guitar, and approached him with the offer to join the group. After initially turning them down, Maestro's manager called Cauchi and told him Maestro had changed his mind.[citation needed]

In 1968, after touring locally and playing in clubs and small venues, the Del-Satins attended a "Battle of the Bands" and encountered a seven piece brass group named the Rhythm Method. Impressed with each other's skills and talents, the groups decided to try to join forces. The name supposedly came from the joke that the group would be "harder to sell than the Brooklyn Bridge".[citation needed]

Johnny and the Bridge rehearsed their unusual combination of smooth vocal harmonies and full horns, and signed a recording contract with Buddha records. Their first release, a version of the Jimmy Webb song "The Worst That Could Happen" (a note-for-note cover of the version previously recorded by The 5th Dimension on the album The Magic Garden, which had not been released as a single), reached No. 3 on the Billboard pop chart. The follow up, "Welcome Me Love", and its flip side, Blessed is the Rain — both by Tony Romeo —[3] each reached the Top 50. A dramatic version of "You'll Never Walk Alone" and the controversial "Your Husband, My Wife" also reached the middle ranges of the charts. The group sold over 10 million records by 1972, including LP sales, mostly produced by Wes Farrell. Appearances on Ed Sullivan, The Della Reese Show and other programs helped to bring the group to the national stage.

After its heyday, The Brooklyn Bridge downsized to a five-man group, with the vocalists playing their own instruments. For example, Maestro could be seen on stage playing rhythm guitar, while former Rhythm Method bassist Jim Rosica picked up a vocal part. Later in the 1970s, as the Rock and Roll Revival evolved from a nostalgic fad to a respected genre, the group began to add members, retaining its core vocalists. By 1985, the group had solidified into an eight piece group, including original Del Satins Cauchi and Fred Ferrara and original Bridge member Rosica, and augmented by a horn section for special occasions. The drummer for the current line up Lou Agiesta, was the drummer for the original American touring company of Jesus Christ Superstar.

The later version of the Brooklyn Bridge released a Christmas EP in 1989 and a greatest hits compilation in 1993, re-recording Maestro's hits with The Crests. In the early 1990s, Maestro moonlighted as the background tenor on Joel Katz's studio project CD "Joel & the Dymensions" (which also featured baritone-bass Bobby Jay). In 1994, The Brooklyn Bridge recorded a 10-song a cappella CD.

Recently, the Brooklyn Bridge was featured in one of PBS's biggest fundraising events ever, "Doo Wop 50", performing both "Sixteen Candles" and "The Worst That Could Happen" (the entire program was released on VHS and DVD). In 2005, the Brooklyn Bridge released a full concert-length DVD as part of the "Pops Legends Live" series. They continue to tour and in 2004 released a CD titled "Today", featuring more re-recordings of their hits and versions of other groups' songs of the 1950s and 60's.

Chester Robert "Chet" Simmons died he was 81. Simmons was an American sports executive, working at three different television networks sports divisions (first ABC, later becoming President of NBC Sports, and then in 1979 becoming the first President of ESPN) before becoming the first Commissioner of the United States Football League in 1982.

Dick Giordano was born in New York City, in the borough of Manhattan. Beginning as a freelance artist at Charlton Comics in 1952, Giordano rose to editor-in-chief by 1965.[3] He made his first mark in the industry with Charlton, overseeing the revamping of its few existing superheroes and having his artists and writers create new such characters for what he called the company's "Action Hero" line. (Many of these artists included new talent Giordano brought on board, featuring such names as Jim Aparo, Denny O'Neil, and Steve Skeates.)[3]

DC Comics' then-publisher Carmine Infantino hired Giordano as an editor in 1967, with Giordano also bringing over to DC many of the creators he had nurtured at Charlton.[3] While none of his titles (such as Bat Lash and Deadman) were a commercial hit, they were critical successes.

By 1971 Giordano had left DC to partner with artistNeal Adams for their Continuity Associates studios, which served as an art packager for comic book publishers, including such companies as Giordano's former employer Charlton Comics,[4]Marvel Comics, and the one-shot Big Apple Comix. Continuity served as the launching pad for the careers of a number of professional cartoonists, many of whom were mentored by Giordano during their time there.

During this period, until he left the company, Giordano wrote a monthly column published in DC titles called "Meanwhile..." which (much like Marvel's "Bullpen Bulletins") featured news and information about the company and its creators. (Giordano closed each "Meanwhile..." column with the characteristic words, "Thank you and good afternoon.") Giordano also continued to ink, such as over George Pérez's pencils on the 1986 crossover Crisis on Infinite Earths, and John Byrne's pencils on The Man of Steel and Action Comics.

Since 2002 he has also drawn several issues of The Phantom published in Europe and Australia. In the mid-2000s, he began sitting on the board of directors of the comic industry charity A Commitment To Our Roots (ACTOR), renamed in 2006 the Hero Initiative. In 2005, F+W Publications Inc. published Drawing Comics with Dick Giordano (which he wrote and illustrated), a book in which he shares his drawing methods and techniques that he used in comics.

Giordano was married for many years to the former Marie Trapani (sister of fellow comics artist Sal Trapani), who died from stomach cancer in 1993.[13] Marie's death, combined with Giordano's increasing hearing loss, hastened his decision to retire from DC.[14]

Former NFL linebacker Elijah Alexander has died after a nearly five-year battle with cancer. He was 39.Medical City Hospital spokeswoman Bianca Jackson said Alexander died Wednesday night at the Dallas facility. She declined to comment on cause of death.

Alexander was diagnosed with multiple myeloma, a cancer of the bone marrow, in 2005, four years after his career ended in Oakland.

The former Kansas State player spent nine seasons with four teams. After one year with Tampa Bay in 1992, Alexander spent three seasons each in Denver and Indianapolis. He made 29 starts in 30 games for Oakland during the final two years of his career in 2000-01. To see more of who died in 2010click here

Harold W. McGraw Jr., the former chief executive officer of McGraw-Hill Cos. who fought off a hostile takeover of the family business, has died. He was 92.

McGraw Jr. died at his home this morning, New York-based McGraw-Hill said today in a statement. He was chairman emeritus of McGraw-Hill. His son Harold “Terry” McGraw III has led the company as CEO since 1998, adding the title of chairman in 2000.

“My father was a passionate and principled leader, who led McGraw-Hill with an educator’s heart and an insistence that the underlying principles guiding the company since its founding in 1888 -- integrity, quality, value and excellence -- would endure,” McGraw III said in the statement.

McGraw-Hill, founded in 1888 by McGraw Jr.’s grandfather James H. McGraw, owns Standard & Poor’s ratings service, an education publishing business and J.D. Power and Associates. McGraw Jr. joined the company as a book sales representative in 1947 after stints in advertising and book retailing.

McGraw Jr. ran the company as CEO from 1975 to 1983 and stayed on as chairman through 1988. During his tenure, he fought off a hostile takeover attempt by American Express in 1979. He retired in 1988 at 70 after being elected chairman emeritus.

He contributed to literacy organizations and established the Business Council for Effective Literacy. He received the Literacy Award in 1990 from President George H.W. Bush in recognition of his commitment to education.

McGraw Jr. was born in New York on Jan. 10, 1918. He graduated from Princeton University in 1940 and served as a captain in the Army Air Corps in World War II. In 1940 he married Anne Per-Lee, who died in 2002.

He is survived by three children: McGraw III, Robert P. McGraw, who is on the company’s board, and Suzanne McGraw. Another son, Thomas, died in 2006. He is also survived by eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

Culp came to national attention very early in his career as the star of the 1957-1959 Western television series Trackdown in which he played Texas Ranger Hoby Gilman. Trackdown was a spin-off of Dick Powell's Zane Grey Theater, also on CBS. Culp's character was introduced in an episode titled "Badge of Honor". Culp had previously appeared in two other episodes of Zane Grey Theater - "Morning Incident" and "Calico Bait" (both 1960) playing different roles. Trackdown then had a CBS spin-off of its own: Wanted: Dead or Alive, with Steve McQueen as bounty hunter Josh Randall.

Culp then played secret agent Kelly Robinson, who masqueraded as a professional tennis player, for three years on the hit NBC series I Spy (1965-68), with co-star Bill Cosby. Culp wrote the scripts for seven episodes, one of which he also directed. One episode earned him an Emmy nomination for writing. For all three years of the series he was also nominated for an acting Emmy (Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Dramatic Series category), but lost each time to Cosby.

In 1973 Culp almost took the male lead in the tv sci-fi series Space: 1999. Unfortunately, during negotiations with creator and executive producer Gerry Anderson, Culp expressed himself to be not only an asset as an actor, but also as a director and producer for the proposed series. The part went to Martin Landau.

In 1981 he starred in The Greatest American Hero as tough-as-nails FBI Agent Bill Maxwell, who teams up with a special education teacher who receives superpowers from extraterrestrials. That show lasted three years ending in 1983. He reprised the role in a voice-over on the stop-motion sketch comedy Robot Chicken.

In 1987, he reunited with Bill Cosby, this time on The Cosby Show, playing Dr. Cliff Huxtable's old friend Scott Kelly. The name was a combination of their I Spy characters' names.

When contract negotiations with Larry Hagman over his character, J.R. Ewing, on the TV series Dallas, it was widely reported[who?] that Culp was ready to step into the role.However, this turned out to be a false rumor. Culp said in interviews that he was never contacted by anyone from Dallas about the part. He was working on The Greatest American Hero at the time and stated that he would not have left his role as Maxwell even if it had been offered.

One of his most recent recurring roles was a part on Everybody Loves Raymond as Warren Whelan - Debra Barone's father and Ray's father-in-law.

Although primarily known from television, Culp also worked as an actor in many theatrical films, beginning with three in 1963: As naval officer John F. Kennedy's good friend Ensign George Ross in PT 109, as legendary gunslingerWild Bill Hickok in The Raiders and as the debonair fiance of Jane Fonda in the romantic comedy Sunday in New York.

He went on to star in the provocative Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice in 1969, probably the height of his movie career. Another memorable role came as another gunslinger, Thomas Luther Price, in Hannie Caulder (1971) opposite Raquel Welch. A year later, Hickey & Boggs reunited him with Cosby for the first time since I Spy. Culp also directed this feature film, in which he and Cosby portray over-the-hill private eyes. In 1986, he had a primary role as General Woods in the comedy Combat Academy.

The video clip of "Guilty Conscience" features Culp as an erudite and detached narrator describing the scenes where Eminem and Dr Dre rap lyrics against each other. He only appears in the music video. In the album version, the narrator is Richard "Segal" Heredia.

On November 9, 2007 on The O'Reilly Factor, host Bill O'Reilly interviewed Culp about the actor's long career and awarded Culp with the distinction "TV Icon of the Week".

Culp died on March 24, 2010, after a fall that took place outside his Los Angeles home.[2] He was 79 years old.

Born in Gisborne, New Zealand as Margaret Wilson, to a homemaker and a man who made swimming pools, she got her first camera at age 8. She changed her name to Margaret Gipsy Moth reportedly because of her love for parachuting from Tiger Moth airplanes and her desire to have her "own" name.[1]

In July 1992, Moth was shot and severely wounded while filming in Sniper Alley in Sarajevo.[3] She underwent multiple surgeries that saved her life, but was left with permanent damage to her face and voice that, she said, left her sounding perpetually drunk. Despite her injuries, she returned to work in Sarajevo six months later, joking that she was going back to look for her missing teeth. [4]

She was the subject of the CNN documentary Fearless: the Margaret Moth Story, which aired in October 2009. It was the story of her reporting the news in dangerous war zones, without fear. In the documentary, she was quoted as saying, "I've gotten everything out of life."

In 2007, Moth was diagnosed with colon cancer. Two years later, she told a CNN documentary crew "I would have liked to think I'd have gone out with a bit more flair ... the important thing is to know that you've lived your life to the fullest... You could be a billionaire, and you couldn't pay to do the things we've done." [5]

Blanche Thebom made her concert debut in 1941, with the Metropolitan Opera, as Fricka in December 1941. She made her Met debut in November 1944 at the Philadelphia's Academy of Music as Brangäne in Tristan und Isolde. She was the leading dramatic mezzo-soprano of the Metropolitan Opera for 22 years, created the American premiere performances of Baba the Turk in Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress, the Mother in Strauss' Arabella, and Mére Marie in Francis Poulenc's Dialogues of the Carmelites. In her 22 seasons with the Met (1944-1959, 1960-1967) she appeared in 356 performances, 28 roles, and 27 works. She also sang in various opera houses in America and Europe, with increasing success. The first American to sing at the Bolshoi Opera in Moscow, Blanche Thebom is also remembered for her Dorabella in the historic production directed by Alfred Lunt of Mozart's Cosi fan Tutte, and for her Brangäne on Flagstad/Wilhelm Furtwängler recording of Tristan und Isolde.

In 1967 Blanche Thebom was appointed head of the Southern Regional Opera Company in Atlanta. It folded in 1968. In 1968 she was appointed director of the opera workshop of San Francisco State University. Blanche Thebom founded the Opera Arts Training Program, a three-week workshop in conjunction with San Francisco Girls Chorus in 1988. She lives and teaches in San Francisco.

Upon her retirement from the Metropolitan ca. 1960, she taught and directed opera performance in Atlanta and Little Rock until around 1980. She appeared in summer theatre revivals of Broadway musicals such as The Sound of Music (as the Mother Abbess) in Atlanta.

Marva Wright, the New Orleans blues and gospel singer who left her job as a school secretary to sing around the world, died Tuesday of complications from two strokes suffered last summer. She was 62.

Ms. Wright died at the eastern New Orleans home of her eldest daughter, where she had been living since her health went into decline last year.

She sang traditional jazz and gospel standards but was better known for sultry, sometimes bawdy blues standards, including "Heartbreakin' Woman" and "Mama, He Treats Your Daughter Mean."

She released a series of albums on local and international record labels, and frequently performed in Europe and at blues festivals around the country. With her band, the BMWs, she drew large crowds for performances at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.

"She truly was and will remain the Blues Queen of New Orleans," said Adam Shipley, Ms. Wright's manager. "I cherish all the time I spent with her. She was one of the highlights to ever grace the stage at Tipitina's."

Enormously popular among fellow musicians, Ms. Wright moved easily between gospel spirituals and bawdy blues romps. She released a series of albums on local and international record labels, and frequently performed in Europe and at blues festivals around the country. She drew large crowds for her performances at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival presented by Shell. Her annual Christmas concerts at Tipitina's featured a broad range of singers and musicians.

Ms. Wright grew up on First Street in Central City alongside Jo "Cool" Davis and Sammy Berfect, also destined to impact the city's gospel community. As a child, she listened to her mother sing and play piano at Greater St. Stephen Full Gospel Baptist Church. Her mother had attended McDonogh 24 elementary school with future gospel legend Mahalia Jackson.

"My mother would go to the national Baptist convention," Ms. Wright once said. "When it convened in Chicago (where Jackson had moved), Mahalia would say, 'Girl, you don't need to get no hotel. Stay with me.' That's what my mother would do. I met Mahalia when I was 9 years old, but I never realized she was that popular until I got older."

As she considered leaving her secretarial post at Eleanor McMain Secondary School to embark on a career as a singer, she wrestled with the idea of performing sacred gospel music in secular clubs. She consulted with her old friend Davis, who urged her to make the leap.

Keith Spera / The Times-PicayuneMarva Wright, right, and guitarist Tab Benoit perform at the Democratic National Convention delegates welcoming party in Denver on August 24, 2008.

"You can only go so far in gospel," Davis said. "I'd put Marva in a category with Mavis Staples. People want to sing, they are inspired to sing. But not everybody has that raw, natural talent, like Marva. Somebody that talented has to go another route."

She nurtured her early career in Bourbon Street clubs, including the Old Absinthe Bar. In 1990, while working at the Bourbon Street Gospel and Blues Club, she met "60 Minutes" correspondent Ed Bradley. They became close friends; up until his death, Bradley introduced Ms. Wright for her Jazz Fest performances.

While some performers look down on Bourbon Street venues, Ms. Wright understood their role in launching her career. "I love Bourbon Street," she said in 2008. "If it wasn't for Bourbon Street, I wouldn't be where I'm at now. You meet a lot of people from all over the world."

In the 1990s, her audience at the Uptown club Muddy Waters occasionally included a daughter of then-Vice President Al Gore, and Gore's wife, Tipper. That led to an invitation to perform at the White House during the Clinton years.

Hurricane Katrina inundated her rented home near the intersection of Morrison and Crowder in eastern New Orleans with nearly 8 feet of water. She and her second husband, Anthony Plessy, moved to Bel Air, Maryland, near the homes of Plessy's adult children. During her year in Maryland, Ms. Wright was not impressed with the culinary sensibilities of her home-in-exile.

"I cooked gumbo without the essentials -- our crabs and shrimp," she recalled in 2008. "And they didn't have hot sausage. Somebody sent me some crab boil seasoning. I used that. I'll never forget, I cooked gumbo for Thanksgiving. I put in chicken and smoked sausage -- I don't do that here because I don't need to."

She finally returned to the New Orleans area and settled in Harvey. From January 2007 through March 2008, Ms. Wright was featured most weekends in the Ritz-Carlton's On Trois Lounge. After parting ways with the Ritz, she returned to Bourbon Street with her band, the BMWs - an acronym for the "Band of Marva Wright."

In August 2008, Ms. Wright was part of the delegation of Louisiana artists who performed at the Denver welcoming party for Democratic National Convention delegates. On a stage in a Colorado Convention Center ballroom, Ms. Wright sang "A Change Is Gonna Come," accompanied by guitarist Tab Benoit and others. Irma Thomas, Terence Blanchard and Randy Newman were also part of the show.

In 2009, Ms. Wright suffered two strokes. She was first hospitalized in mid-May after what was described as a "minor" stroke. She recovered sufficiently to start performing once again.

However, she returned to the hospital after another, more traumatic stroke on June 6. In the difficult weeks and months that followed, she underwent dialysis treatments and was fed via a feeding tube.